426 
(or recent) date’) in the stream-tin deposits in the mine Ditjang No. 8 
in the district Tandjong Pandang, not far from the present beach. 
Still, from De Groot’s description we are unable to infer whether 
or no this bed of stream-tin-ore (Kaksa) lies above the mean sea-level 
of this day, while VerBeek reports that, most probably, it lies rather 
below the present sea-level. In 1911 -I found a precisely similar 
deposit of recent shells in the Kaksa of the Merante-mine in the 
district of Linggang. This mine is not far from the coast and the 
bed of shells occurs about 8 meters below the surface. Though 
the exact height of the surface is not known, we may safely say 
that this bed, at any rate, does not lie above, but below mean 
sea-level. VERBEFK’) states the occurrence of just such shell-beds not 
only in the localities mentioned above, but also in mine No. 30 to 
the east of Manggar and in mine No. 1 in the district of Linggang, 
and adds that they are situated about at the present sea-level. 
In connection with what has been said, I think that these occurrences 
of shells of very recent date, do not entitle us to draw conclusions 
about a possible slight uprise of the island with reference to the 
sea-level. > 
In the tectonically unstable portion of the Sunda Land, to which 
the greater part of Sumatra and Java belongs, various diastrophie 
movements are known to have occurred in pleistocene and post- 
pleistocene time. It is not my object to mention them or to 
discuss the way in which they originated. 
The Sahul Bank. 
The Sahul Bank is the submerged portion of a flat land, probably 
a peneplain that belonged to a large country of which in pleistocene 
time Australia, New-Guinea, the Aru-islands and some neighbouring 
islands formed a part. After the close of the pleistocene glacial period 
this low-lying land has been flooded consequent on the general 
rise of the sea-level. This flooded portion is the present Sahul Shelf 
(Fig. 1), which now lies on an average about 50 m. below the 
sea-level just about as deep as the Sunda Shelf. 
1) Martin has examinated these shells and comes to the conclusion “that the 
fauna in question belongs to a very recent past” and ‘‘that the fauna agrees with 
that of the sea surrounding the island of Blitong.” See K. MARTIN. On a posttertiary 
fauna from the stream-tin-deposits of Blitong. Notes from the Leyden Museum 
Vol. HI p. 17 and 19, 1881. 
3) R. D. M. VERBEEK l.c. pg. 170. 
